


Feral

by CobaltStargazer



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Emotional Trauma, Gen, Human Experimentation, Hurt Wanda Maximoff, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-14
Updated: 2016-12-14
Packaged: 2018-09-08 13:56:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 938
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8847691
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CobaltStargazer/pseuds/CobaltStargazer
Summary: You try to be kind where you can, even though that isn't why they hired you.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [justanothersong](https://archiveofourown.org/users/justanothersong/gifts).



The girl refuses to utter a word of English, even though her records say she's fluent. The boy is communicative in both English and Russian, but his sister declines to use any language other than the one she was born speaking. And quite frankly, she's the one who holds your interest. The boy will make an impact one day as well, you're sure of it, but the girl? You've never seen such determination.

Mother was a factory worker born in Krakow. Father was from Moscow, a minor figure in the local Communist party. When you were born, it was already decided that you would attend medical school, even though Communism was in the first throes of collapse by then. You graduated in the top three percent of your class, specializing in biological research, and though government jobs were almost non-existent when you began to look for work, you managed to find a job in a more private facility. Not that you had intended to spend your life doing human experimentation, but....one must work to earn one's keep. 

The subjects are tethered to gurneys, restrained by leather straps that buckle around their wrists and ankles. They have to be, to keep from injuring themselves or the staff. Mostly the staff. The project is so shrouded in secrecy that even you aren't sure of how many people are working on it, but the toll the experiments take on the subjects is dramatic. Most of them were abducted by HYDRA and brought to the facility. Some of them are vagrants who would otherwise be begging on the streets and living in their own filth. This way, their lives have meaning and purpose, because they're furthering the cause of science. Assisting in the discovery of the next evolutionary step.

A third of them died within the first two months. Aneurysms. Embolisms. Coronaries. Some of them simply stopped breathing during the night and didn't start again. You weren't surprised. The human body can only tolerate so much, and the work took as much as it gave. The cleanup crew buried the bodies, and eventually more test subjects were 'recruited'. 

But the girl and her brother sought out Strucker on their own, and you were excited to work with twins, people with such a close genetic relationship. And when they survived the first round of experiments, you were the one who helped the girl back to her quarters. As volunteers, the two of them had been granted limited privileges. Much like Communist Russia, HYDRA only helped those who served their cause, and later that night you read their files. Orphaned, no close family, traumatized by the bombing deaths of their parents, psychologically scarred. But useful. Useful and strong, or they'd not have lived.

You watch them, or more specifically you watch her, and you prefer not to think of _how_ close to her brother she might be. Sexual interest in her is moot. She is a test subject and you are a man of science, and that's the extent of it. But you aren't Strucker, who seems to take a prurient interest in the relationship, and you find it distasteful. Better to focus on the clinical aspects of things.

You're carrying her back to her rooms one night, because the second to last round of trials was particularly brutal on the remaining subjects, and she's unable to walk despite her best attempts. You couldn't find a wheelchair, the last one having been commandeered to transport her brother back to his bed. She tries to slap your hands away, resisting your assistance with what little strength she has left, but the front of her hospital shirt is spattered with blood from her nose, and her eyes are big and glassy with shock. When she subsides, you pick her up, and she wipes her bloody fingers down the lapel of your white lab coat, leaving a crimson smear.

"That's fine, then. You can sleep soon."

You slip into Russian without considering it, and you've never spoken to her before, not directly. Above her still-bleeding nose, her eyes roll up towards you, and you think she's about to lose consciousness. Which would be a first. But she just looks at you as you finish the walk down the dimly-lit hallway, then carry her through the open door. She's much shorter than you are, but you're built like Father, with blocky shoulders and a belly that is quickly becoming fat from too much good food and vodka. You put her down on the bed, which is still made, and this time her blood-stained fingers touch your cheek, making it sticky. You're not even sure she sees you through the pain.

"I...sleep."

She speaks in your language, and it touches some distant thing inside you, that she acknowledges you. You try to be kind, even though that isn't why HYDRA hired you. And in the morning, provided she's rested, you'll put her through her paces again even if it means more pain and another bloody nose. But this one will live. She and her brother will live, because you're looking into her eyes and you've never seen anything so determined to survive. To survive and pay back the hurt that she went through in triplicate. 

_Feral_. That's the word you want. For a brief instant, you touch her hair, which is damp with perspiration. She twitches out from under your hand, and you draw it back as if she might bite.

Disturbed, you leave her alone, turning the light off on your way out. An extra drink before bed tonight seems in order. Maybe several extra drinks.


End file.
